Tony Kurdzuk/The Star-LedgerGoaltender Martin Brodeur and the Devils will draw on a wealth of experience this season.

The Devils, to borrow a line from "The Blues Brothers," are getting the band back together. Bobby Holik is back, ready to start grinding in the corners again. Brian Rolston is back, centering the top line.

It feels like 1995 around this team, and not just because the stock market is headed to where it was then. Their top rivals might be getting younger and embracing the new NHL, but the Devils - always the proud contrarians of pro hockey - are stubbornly going back in time.

Here is the problem with reunion tours: They are rarely as good as the original thing. Starting Friday night at the Prudential Center, the Devils are hoping they can scratch out one more Stanley Cup run using their old formula, but they're doing it at the risk of just looking old.

Holik is 37. Rolston is 35. And, most importantly, goaltender Martin Brodeur is 36. The Devils have their share of good young players, but they are a team built to win now at a time when teams like the Penguins, the Rangers and Capitals have skated past them.

Gone are the days when the Devils started each season as the most feared team in the Eastern Conference. The window is slowly closing on the Brodeur Era, and even the foundation of this franchise understands that he is running out of chances to win one more Cup before skating to the Hall of Fame.

Brodeur will not only set the all-time win record this season. He will pass Patrick Roy for the most minutes for a goalie if he stays healthy, playing more than 60,000 minutes as an NHL goaltender. The Devils marvel at their cornerstone, but they also have to wonder.

How long can he keep going?

"I get that every year," Brodeur said after practice yesterday. "I was old at 30. I'm still old at 36, and I'll be old when I'm done with my contract at 40. I'm at peace with me, and that's the most important thing."

Brodeur begins his 16th season as the oldest starting goalie in the league, which is fitting, since the Devils figure to have one of the oldest rosters, too. The goalie has changed his habits and hired a personal trainer this summer. He looks trimmer and plans to actually let backup Kevin Weekes see the ice more than just the few seconds it takes to skate to the bench.

Still, the four-time Vezina Trophy winner is coming off a run of three straight subpar postseasons. The final image of 2008 is not Brodeur holding up hardware, but blowing off former Rangers instigator Sean Avery in the handshake line. The hated Rangers won the first-round series in five games, but beyond that, looked like the team with a better future.

Even Brodeur used the word "chaotic" to describe the past three seasons around what had always been, under Lou Lamoriello, the most stable franchise in the NHL, and one of the most in pro sports.

"Last year, we had a lot of question marks all year long, and it's been that way for three years," Brodeur said. "The stability of this hockey club is better than it's been in a long, long time. Who knows if this is going to be the year (they win another Cup), because there's a lot of time between now and when that can happen. Right now, it's as good as we've felt in a long time in this locker room."

The good feeling comes from familiarity. Rolston, who scored 31 goals for the Minnesota Wild last season, is a much more complete player than he was when Lamoriello traded him in 1999. Holik, who crossed the Hudson for the Rangers' fat wallet in 2002, is still a valuable defensive player even as his skills decline.

"They weren't brought back because they're ex-Devils, they were brought back because they're good hockey players," head coach Brent Sutter said. But can they counter Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in Pittsburgh? Or Alexander Ovechkin in Washington?

This is the challenge when a franchise makes the playoffs every season. It never has a chance to draft the most talented players, instead hoping for late-round steals. The Devils look like they're caught in that purgatory many former champs find themselves in eventually - good enough to reach the playoffs, but not quite good enough to win a championship.

Five seasons have passed since their last Cup victory, and the Devils are dialing the clock back even further. Rolston and Holik are back in their same locker room with their old friend Brodeur, and they can only hope this reunion tour goes better than most of them do.